NFL: Point Differential and the NFC West

Through five weeks, the standings in the NFL are showing us what we all know, that the NFL is unpredictable. Six teams that I predicted would not qualify for the playoffs are sitting atop each of their respective divisions: Washington, Chicago, Arizona, NY Jets, Houston, and Kansas City. Their leads are tenuous at best and in Houston’s case each team in the AFC South is 3-2. Let’s stay with Houston for a moment, or rather the AFC South, which, arguably, is the best division in the league. There is a weird phenomenon that is going on in that division at the moment. Here are the teams in order and their point differentials:

Houston: -18

Jacksonville: -30

Indianapolis: +35

Tennessee: +37

Neither Houston nor Jacksonville will remain on top with that kind of point differential. Since the divisional split in 2002, there have been only two teams* that have won their division with a negative point differential, and this is probably going to surprise absolutely no one:

2006 Seattle Seahawks (-6)

2004 Seattle Seahawks (-2)

*The 2008 Arizona Cardinals came very close with a robust +1

By way of comparison, only two other current division leaders sport a negative point differential, Washington is at -3 (the rest of the NFC East is in the black) and Arizona is leading with a bloody-red -50. Incidentally, although not surprisingly, the NFC West is the only division with an entire slate of negative point-differential teams: Arizona -50, Seattle -2, St. Louis -13, and San Francisco -54.

(If you’re interested, here are the divisional totals: NFC East +18, NFC North +58, NFC South -24, NFC West -119, AFC East -11, AFC North +35, AFC South +24, and AFC West +19).

I know that the NFL is cyclical, so I’m just waiting to see when the NFC West will pick its collective sorry self off of the floor. I thought (erroneously) that San Francisco was making strides and that this year they’d be good. Hell, I predicted (moronically) that they’d finish 11-5 (They can still get there! They just need to win 11 straight!). Regardless as to what happens with San Francisco the rest of this year (and this has all the makings of a lost season for them) I still like their makeup for the future, so long as Mike Singletary is not running the ship.

Recently, on Bill Simmons’s podcast NFL.com’s Mike Lombardi echoed something I have been thinking about. I know that Singletary is a tough guy and a great motivator type but I worry about a coach who does not have any offensive or defensive coordinator experience. I think Lombardi was talking about Jack Del Rio, although I can’t recall exactly (although Del Rio was a D-Coordinator in Carolina for one year). The guys who Singletary may mirror closely are Herm Edwards and Mike Tice. Both of whom were only position coaches (defensive backs and tight ends/offensive line respectively) before being promoted to head coach in Kansas City and Minnesota. I’m sure those guys were good position coaches, just as Mike Singletary may have been, but there are big, strategic differences between being responsible for a position and being responsible for an entire side of the ball–much less an entire team. Position coaches don’t have to think of big-picture issues, in a game or in a season. They have to make sure that their guys are ready to play within a scheme and a strategy that has been set up by someone else. Also, if a team is flailing and a head coach has no experience in making big picture decisions with respect to the offense or defense, then what exactly is his usefulness? Motivational tactics can work if the only thing a team needs is a kick in the pants, but what if the issues have to do with scheme and the guy in charge has no knowledge of how to make wholesale strategic and tactical changes? Then what? Failure, that’s what.

I’m not saying that position coaches with no coordinator experience can’t be successful, just that it’s not surprising when they aren’t. And Singletary could turn it around, but he could end up like Herm Edwards, although maybe not the TV gig despite the fact that Singletary is such a delight.

With that in mind, all of the three other coaches in the division are (very successful) ex-coordinators, and in the case of Pete Carroll, he was a former NFL head coach and ran a semi-pro team in L.A. St. Louis is going to be the team to watch out for in the near and distant future because they have a franchise QB, new (good) ownership, and a good, experienced head coach. I’m not as bullish on Arizona’s long-term prospects because their ownership situation has always been a little shaky and while Max Hall is a nice story, he is no Sam Bradford. I also like the direction that Seattle is headed in because of its management and we’ll see about the coaching and the long-term prospects at QB (as it is, they have none–Chuckie Dub may be good, but we’ll see).